On Sept. 5, R. Smith Simpson, who helped found Georgetown’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy, died near his home in Charlottesville, Va. He was 103.
Simpson was a career Foreign Service officer. After receiving his law degree from Cornell University in 1931, he served as a labor policy advisor for the National Recovery Administration. He spent 23 years in the U.S. Foreign Service and later helped select future diplomatic officers, which showed him that many candidates’ knowledge of international geography, culture, and sociology was deficient.
This troubled him. In a 1962 Foreign Service Journal article entitled, “Are We Getting Our Share of the Best?” Simpson wrote that “an educational system that turns out graduates lacking the simplest … knowledge about their country is not an adequate educational system.” In 1978, along with his friend Peter F. Krogh who had recently become the Dean of the School of Foreign Service, Simpson established the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy.
“Smith was a real pioneer in the field of teaching diplomacy and he was a pioneer in establishing the Institute for the Study of Diplomacy—we worked hand in hand on that,” Krogh, now a dean emeritus at the School of Foreign Service, said. “Simpson thought there was a big gap there that needed to be filled.”
Simpson was also instrumental in creating the SFS curriculum that Georgetown still uses today. In particular, Simpson created Map of the Modern World, a required course for all SFS students in which students learn the locations of contemporary states and their major geographical features.
Krogh said he remembers Simpson most for his enduring passion for diplomacy and for education.
“You know, usually when people get older they tend to get a little less passionate about things,” Krogh said. “But not Smith. He was highly charged on this his whole life.”
Smith is survived by his daughters Margaret and Zelia, three granddaughters, and five great-grandchildren. His wife, Henriette Lanniée, died in 2007.
-Additional reporting by Matt Chung
